Burger King Uses SpongeBob in Ads Despite Promise To "Reduce" Use of Cartoons Promoting Kids' Meals

(MoneyWatch)  Burger King is promoting a 99-cent kids' meal in a TV spot featuring SpongeBob Squarepants even though the company joined a campaign to reduce the use of cartoon characters to promote junk food (see video below). Anyone who buys the meal gets a SpongeBob toy. BK's ads are handled by Crispin, Porter & Bogusky.

In September 2007, Burger King signed on to the Children's Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative. The purpose of the initiative was to fight childhood obesity by voluntarily restricting the advertising of junk food to kids and reducing the use of kids' TV cartoon characters in junk food advertising. The initiative described its work this way:

Participating companies also have agreed to:

Reduce the use of third-party licensed characters in advertising primarily directed to children under 12 that does not meet the Initiative's product or messaging criteria.

There were skeptics at the time:

Jeff Cronin, communications director at the Center for Science in the Public Interest, Washington, said CARU was only making changes "on the margins." "Sen. [Tom] Harkin [D-Iowa] had a bill that would give the FTC more authority to regulate junk food ads aimed at kids. We'd enthusiastically support it," if it was reintroduced.

Burger King made these specific promises:

We will limit the use of third-party licensed characters in 100% of our National Advertising primarily directed to children under 12 years old to the promotion of Kids Meals that meet the Burger King Corporation Nutrition Criteria

Those nutritional criteria include:

No more than 560 calories per meal; Less than 30 percent of calories from fat;

The spot -- which doesn't advertise specific menu items -- appears to be within the technical letter of Burger King's promise. BK recently updated its pledge to include a macaroni-and-cheese dish for kids that it says is within the guidelines. The ad, featuring the Burger "King" character dancing to a remodelled version of Sir Mixalot's "Baby Got Back," has been airing on late night TV. Kids can't be expected to be in that audience, but their parents can.

The fact that within BK's pledge SpongeBob can again be recruited to promote the burger chain thus illustrates the weakness of voluntary measures to wean kids from their addiction to junk food.

Burger King also recently ran afoul of the Mexican government when it used the Mexican flag as a wrestler costume in spots advertising the chain's Texican Whopper. The client has agreed to change the ads, per Ad Age.

UPDATE: My colleague Katherine Glover at BNET Food has a different take.